After Post Checklist

Here are 19 things you can do when your blog post is about to go live. I like to call it the After Post checklist because I’ve finished writing the post and most of the to-do list items below have to do with social media. So if you think tweeting and pinning your posts are the only things to do after you hit publish, this after post checklist is for you.

1. Pin your post to Pinterest

Be sure to use a short permalink when pinning on Pinterest. For example, yourwebsite.com/short-permalink, instead of yourwebsite.com/01/01/2017/title-of-the-blog-post-link. Amy Lynn Andrews has a great post explaining permalinks and how you choose them.

2. Schedule the post to pin to many group boards

If you’re signed up with a service that lets you pin to multiple boards, schedule those pins to go out. If you are not signed up, you can set a calendar reminder to pin to some various group boards over five to ten days after your post goes live.

3. Share and pin on Twitter

Share the post on twitter at least three times the day your post is live. Also, pin a tweet that includes a photo at the top of your twitter profile. This helps the post get more exposure when someone goes to your twitter profile. You’ll only want to keep this up until your next post goes live or until you have something else that needs to be pinned.

4. Share on Facebook Page and in Groups

If you have a Facebook Page, be sure to share it there the day it goes live and if any groups you are in have a post available for sharing posts be sure that the group is the right audience for the post and share away.

5. Scheduled to be shared on Twitter more times

Share it on twitter over the next 7 days at least once per day. Use a program like Buffer or Coschedule to schedule out your tweets. If you’re not signed up with those programs, TweetDeck is twitter’s free version of those apps and all you have to have is a twitter account to login.

6. Share on Instagram

Use a post and/or use the link in your Instagram profile to share the post. Always change the link in your profile to your newest post or relevant content. Use bit.ly to shorten.

7. Interact in the comments

Be sure to interact in the comments, especially the first week the post goes out. That’s when the most eyes are going to be on it. If you don’t interact with your readers, they may perceive that you don’t care about their opinions or that you do not want to help them. Remember they take the time to read your post and comment, take some time to give back to them as well.

8. Schedule the post to go live

Once you’ve finished editing your post, you’ll want to schedule it to go live. If you have the right settings in WordPress, you can also send out a tweet, facebook post, etc the second it goes live. You change that in Settings > Sharing.

9. Periscope or Facebook live about your post

Depending on how interactive you are with your audience and what’s included in the post. Going live is can be really beneficial. If your post has a great content upgrade that gets people to put in their email addresses taking ten to twenty minutes to go live about your post, it could potentially get you some email addresses.

10. Check your analytics to see how much engagement your posts are getting

This doesn’t have to be after every post, but at the end of every month check the engagement for the current month’s posts. See which posts are getting the most views and comments. This will help you to see if there are any patterns and which topics are the most popular. This information can help you create an editorial calendar that is catered toward what your audience likes to see. If you put out a lot of posts, doing this weekly may be helpful.

11. Repin your post after 1-2 months

Always follow up on Pinterest. Pins can gain newfound momentum months later. You’ll want to keep as much content as possible in front of your audience. You also never know when something will take off. It’s a concept called “looping.” If no one is pinning this content, you can repin it a while later and get it in front of your audience again and this allows your older content to stay relevant in your audience’s mind.

12. Check your analytics for traffic

Figure out where the traffic for your post is coming from. Are you driving the traffic there from facebook posts, tweets or pins? After a few months, you can figure out which social media platform is giving you the most traffic. This can help you focus in on using that platform more. This doesn’t mean putting all your eggs in one basket, but you could put forty percent of your eggs in one basket.

13. Tweet or email anyone mentioned or involved with your post

If you share a post or quote or mention anyone in any way, be sure to let them know you shared about them. This can be in a tweet just to them or in a tweet to your audience mentioning them, this way can make it easier for them to retweet it. This isn’t for them to retweet the tweet, but to just let them know that they have had an impact on your work.

14. Add links to any old posts that may be related

Adding older posts at the bottom of your post in the way of “P.S.” or “check out these older posts, if you’re interested in (post’s topic)” is a great way for your readers to stay on the site longer and get them great information. Sometimes, you have to do these days later if you’ve forgottten about a post you’ve written a while ago. This is why I like adding it to this checklist.

15. Thank people that share your post

If someone shares your post on twitter or Pinterest or wherever and you see it, always thank them.

16. Make it easy to share.

There are a few ways to make your posts easier to share: have sharing buttons at the bottom of your post, a click to tweet within the post and/or make sure the permalink is shorter rather than longer.

17. Bloglovin’/RSS Feed

Be sure that your blog is on Bloglovin’ and there is a way for people to sign up for your RSS Feed.

18. Share your post in a Twitter chat

If you have the opportunity when introducing yourself in a twitter chat be sure and share your most recent post.

19. Can this post be expanded upon or made into a series? Add any ideas to your blog post topics list.

Always ask yourself this question at the beginning or ending when writing your post. You want to always be making a list of possible blog post topics. It doesn’t mean you have to use it, but having a running list is always a good idea.

This after post checklist is by no means exhaustive and you don’t even have to do everything that is listed here for every post because this list is not a one size fits all. Most of the to-dos on this list can be applied to most posts, but not to all posts. But you still want to check the after post checklist after every post to be sure that you’re doing everything possible to get your posts seen by new people all the time.

Is there anything I missed? Is there something you do after you’ve written your post that isn’t listed here? I’d love to hear about it.

Hi! I'm Ashley and I love to build WordPress websites. I've been working with WP sites for over five years. I would love to build you an incredible website.
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